A public person revealed last weekend at an event that they kept a hauberk, or coat of chain mail, in their garden shed.
Bartle D’Arcy, general manager of the center, expressed his amazement when a member of the public brought in the excellently preserved artifact.
As a part of [national] heritage week, we held a Norman heritage day. People approached me when I was wearing a chainmail coif and mentioned that they had “some of that” in their shed. “You mean you have some of that in your shed?” I asked.
It is a whole hauberk that is 800 years old, and they delivered it to me two days ago. They merely kept it in their shed after using a digger to remove it from a drain a few years ago. It is very remarkable.
On Thursday, Mr. D’Arcy delivered the chain mail to the National Museum of Ireland. The officers who had only ever seen broken chain mail were astonished to discover an undamaged hauberk.
“This is an incredible discovery. It was all the result of a fortuitous meeting. Because it became lodged in the digger bucket, they were unable to identify what it was. You actually wouldn’t know what it was until you knew your past.
“It was found nearby rather than in Granard, but we are keeping the person’s identify private. We have disclosed it to the museum and are following the book in every way,” he remarked.
There are plans to showcase the chain mail in Longford. According to Mr. D’Arcy, the chain mail would be removed by the museum so that repairs could be made.
Because the chain mail had been in the sea for so long, according to Mr. D’Arcy, it was in such good shape.
It can only rust in an atmosphere with water, and it can only survive in water. It was in peat when the digger brought it up.
It is believed that the chain mail first appeared in Ireland in 1172, just after the Norman conquest. Before putting it on exhibit, it will be conserved and refurbished.